Get to know Bob Peak, partner of The Beverage People

Bob Peak is a partner in The Beverage People—Santa Rosa’s retailer of homebrewing and home winemaking supplies. Starting in 2003, he learned homebrewing directly from one of the icons in the field: Beverage People founder Byron Burch. Since then, he and wife Marty (and more recently, daughter Charlotte) have enjoyed making many styles of beer from extract and from malted barley. Some of the beers have won awards including a blue ribbon at the California State Fair, a first-place gold medal in the Western Regionals of the American Homebrew Association competition, and the rare opportunity to brew a Pro-Am collaboration beer at Bear Republic Brewing in Healdsburg.

With a chemistry degree from Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, California, Bob primarily worked in environmental testing laboratories before switching to the fermentation industry. In 2000, he became general manager at Vinquiry, the wine testing laboratory in Windsor. In 2003, he joined the Beverage People, becoming a partner in the store in 2006.

Bob also enjoys making cheese at home as well as farming and producing wine from his 1/3 acre hobby vineyard of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. He has taken viticulture and enology classes at Santa Rosa Junior College and through UC Davis Extension, is a Certified Beer Judge, and continues to seek the advice of (now retired) Byron Burch on new beer recipes.